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02
Dec

Civilization V Mac FAQs: Tech Support Edition

Posted by Russ Looney

As practically all of you probably know, a new game launch inevitably sees its share of technical issues.  Civilization V Mac has been no different (unfortunately), but the good news is that our tech support staff has been working super hard to make sure you guys get to play the game you paid for!  They’ve compiled a list of some of the top-reported issues and have asked us to post them to our Blog.  Have you had any issues with the game?  Check out the FAQ below to see if your support issue is mentioned!

Update (8/13/12)

I’m having trouble playing Civilization V since updating to OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion. Can you help?

Aspyr is aware that there have been some performance issues that have popped up since the release of MacOS 10.8 and is working hard to find a solution. Please open a support ticket with Aspyr so they can get your system information/saved games/crashlogs. The info you provide will help the team work with their partners to find a solution.  Additional info can be found here.

Why can’t I play the game in OS 10.5?

Of course, we would like to have the game play in as many configurations as possible, but there are some new Open GL extensions that are essential to Civilization 5 that cannot be used in 10.5.  Upgrading to 10.6 from 10.5 is fairly inexpensive and as long as you meet the hardware requirements, you will be playing in no time.

You can purchase an OS upgrade from Apple here: http://store.apple.com/us/search?find=10.6&mco=MTA4MzI5ODk

When playing on a laptop, I can’t get the game to display on my  external monitor.  What the dilly?

You will need to tell the game what monitor you want to play on. When playing on a laptop, the system automatically chooses the laptop monitor as the primary display. To change to the other monitor, hold down the Apple/Command key while launching the game to bring up the initial configuration screen. On this screen, you will see an option to choose multiple monitors. Choose the external monitor, and you are on your way.

I get the error “Steam needs to be running” when I launch the game.

This usually happens if the user already has Steam installed, and they need to update. You can also try reinstalling Steam if the update doesn’t work.

I get grey bars on the screen when I try to play the game.  Make them go away!

This happens when trying to play the game at a super high resolution on really large monitors. This usually doesn’t happen on resolutions lower than 2560×1440. Lower the resolution and the problem will go away.

My problem isn’t listed here!

Don’t forget to check out our Civilization V Mac knowledge base at our support site!  Also, if you have ANY problems, please contact us by phone (512-708-8100) or email (support@aspyr.com).  We’ll get you up and running and on your way to world domination!

Related posts:

  1. Civilization V Mac FAQs, V2
  2. Civilization V Mac FAQs, V3 [Updated]
  3. Civilization V Mac FAQs

Tags: , , , ,   Posted Civilization, Classic Posts, Mac FAQs, Mac Gaming |

  • Andrew Carter

    Care to comment on Civ V locking up machines and requiring a reboot, graphic anomalies when running full screen on newest MacBook Pro’s, lack of deluxe content even though it is being sold as such to mac owners on steam? Hugely disappointed in the lack of quality in this release. You guys should be embarrassed.

    • http://www.gameagent.com BlogLady

      @Andrew You should contact our support folks with specific issues at support.aspyr.com. As for the additional content, as we’ve mentioned many times we are working on it. People who purchase the PC version of Civilization V (be it regular or Special Edition) via Steam have access to the Mac version, but we are not merchandising the Mac version as containing additional content.

  • Ed V

    Running Civ V on current edition 15″ MacBook Pro, which means it more than meets the minimums. I’ll echo Andrew Carter’s issues from the previous post – I get them all. So I guess I’m a little disappointed. Glad to hear your working on it, though.

  • Hacker

    Works great on my hackintosh. The graphics are a tad slow but I am running at the minimum graphics card so that’s not so surprising.

  • Andrew Carter

    I know the fullscreen issue is acknowledged (and may be related to OS X update). Doesn’t matter who’s fault – not a great user experience.

    RE: special edition – It’s pretty misleading when the entry for Civ V on steam has apple + windows listed. Why should I have expected to not get the deluxe content immediately? I don’t care about PC purchases – I’m a Mac user. Nice for them, doesn’t apply to me.

    I know I’m being pretty negative but honestly all I wanted to do was play the game. I don’t have a ton of time to play and I rarely buy games anymore. All the time I would have used to play it have been spent trying to get it running. It reminds me so much of playing games on Windows years ago.

    It’s really hard for me to believe this stuff wasn’t known when you guys where deciding to launch or not. Go to the apple store, buy a stock MPB, hook it up to an Apple monitor and the game does not work until you go figure out how to get it in windowed mode. How can you tell me that should have seen the light of day? I’m sure you’ll work on it, likely fix the issues. But that doesn’t absolve you guys of what is clearly a sloppy launch.

  • James

    There’s a couple of issues that I really should report, which I will do in due time.

    But overall, great launch and I’m looking for the eventual porting of the DLC, as you’ve already mentioned you would not have at launch over and over and over again.

    I have the latest MacBook Pro, which actually has a graphics card instead of those stupid integrated chipsets and I’ve had very few issues on that specifically. Any other issues appear on my iMac as well so I’m guessing it’s a bug or glitch, nothing machine specific. Can’t comment on the 13” MacBook Pros (shouldn’t even be called Pros honestly) but you get what you pay for I guess.

    Once again, thanks for a great launch and your decision to support SteamPlay. I know we don’t have Steam Cloud or DLC content yet (as clearly mentioned over and over and over, and just for emphasis, OVER AND OVER) but I’ve had fair warning so I knew what I was buying and I’m looking for the eventual integration of those services. Thanks a bunch!

    • http://www.gameagent.com BlogLady

      @James Thank you! While there are still patches being worked on, we were glad to be able to provide the product in a timely manner and with the inclusion of some of the PC patch content. We will continue to support the game for the long haul and please always chat with support on specific issues as this is the way we are able to gather product information and details on what we need to look at for future fixes.

      Best

  • Finne

    The graphics menu in Civ V has an anti-alias setting, but it is greyed out! Will you be supporting this? (running on an iMac 3Ghz with GeForce 8800 GS)

    Also there are some graphics options in the list on the right that always revert back to the “Low” setting, even though it appears I can change these options

    • http://www.gameagent.com BlogLady

      @Finne – please submit a support ticket at support.aspyr.com. I don’t actually have the answer to this one off hand and they’ll know the details. Thank you!

  • Elhean

    Should I get any answer from Your support server after submitting new ticket? A mail with ticket number, confirmation?

    • http://www.gameagent.com Russ Looney

      @Elhean You should receive an email reply after submitting a support ticket. Usually you should get the reply almost immediately, though it can take longer at times. Also note that the email is an auto-reply, so it may have gotten stuck in your spam filter.

  • ltcommander.data

    I posted this comment on a previous blog post, but didn’t get a response so I thought I would try again:

    Supported Video Cards:
    NVIDIA GeForce® 8600, 8800, 9600M, GT 120, 320M
    ATI Radeon HD 2600, HD 3870, HD 4670, HD 4850, HD 5670, HD 5750

    I noticed your supported video card list is missing several GPUs that is hard to see why they wouldn’t be supported. Namely the GT130 which is similar to the 8800GS which is supported, the 330M GT, which should be a pretty popular GPU, the GTX285, the HD4870, the HD5770, and most notably the HD5870, the current fastest Mac GPU. It’s probably borderline, but is the popular 9400M supported? The HD2400XT presumably is a no.

    • http://www.gameagent.com Russ Looney

      @Itcommander.data It’s important to distinguish between supported video cards and video cards that will work. The listed cards are the only ones currently supported by our support staff, meaning those are the only ones they’ll be able to help you with in resolving any performance problems, etc. There are almost certainly other video cards that will actually work with the game, but we won’t be able to provide assistance in case of technical difficulty. All that being said, if you have questions about a specific video card, we recommend you reach out to our support team in one of the methods listed in the article.

  • Mikel

    My iMac with the 9400M runs the game at what I consider to be an acceptable performance level… But I may very well be more tolerant than others to deficiencies… I am just anxiously awaiting the chance to play against my Windows-afflicted friends. :)

  • Tony

    I have always wanted to buy civilization 111, but now it is up to no V, I can afford it now .My query is do you have to have the previous versions to have just civilization V
    sincerely Tony

  • http://www.fatjerry.com Dimmer

    Tony: Each of the Civ series (from I through V) are standalone games: no need to purchase one to get another.

    Civ III and IV have had two or three “expansion” packs which add a little to the gameplay while taking a lot from your wallet. As of right now, the only Civ V “expansions” are new civilisations you can start with — no big whoop.

    Net/net: Civ V is a standalone game, go for it!

  • http://www.fatjerry.com Dimmer

    (But Civ III is still my favorite: Civ III Complete is a great buy!)

  • Richard

    It’s ridiculous that the 330M is not a supported video card, given that its the card in half of Apple’s current laptop range.

  • Jim

    Apple’s laptop range is not meant for gaming. You can get away with it on the higher-end/MBP’s, but it’s just not what they’re built for.

    This game has spec issues on Windows as well. I’m not entirely sure what they did to make it suck so much power, but it’s not specific to the Mac port.

  • Ed V

    The 330m is the video card in the higher end of current Apple MBP’s. So I guess I’ll echo Richard’s comment that its a little ridiculous that Aspyr isn’t supporting it.

    • http://www.gameagent.com Russ Looney

      @Richard & Ed V: Good news–the 330M IS supported. We got the green light this morning.

  • Nickolau

    I am trying to play on my 2010 Mbpro 13” but is kinda hard!! The game starts ok but as long as the time passes it becomes veeeeeeeery slow! Almost unplayable… Did I waste my money?

  • Elhean

    Well, what does that mean? My game isn’t working better, I still can’t see video.

    I just find it really hard to believe that i5 4gb 330m MacBook Pro is not enough to play smoothly on LOWEST settings. Something is really wrong here.

    I feel a bit sad since I’m loosing confidence that I will ever have the opportunity to feel this familiar Civilization urge to play with this game. Please, help us get the better of it…

  • Andy

    I pre-ordered the boxed version, way back on Nov. 3rd. Still no game, the “track my order” page still shows “In process”, not shipped, no tracking info, and the email support just keeps apologizing, and promising to get back to me in three days or less (that was on Dec. 2nd). Contacted them again, and they say they’ll get back to me in 72 hours.
    What exactly is going on? In the modern internet age, I’ve never met with this kind of shoddy customer service.

    • http://www.gameagent.com BlogLady

      @ Andy – please send an email to gameagent@aspyr.com so we can investigate your order more closely. Thank you

  • Menso

    I have a MBP with a 9400M chip inside and duo core 2.4 Ghz and 4 GB of memory. The mac version runs absolutely horrible on it. Running the game in Windows XP bootcamp on the same machine gets much better performance. Can anyone explain to me what went wrong with the port and when they’ll fix it?

  • Ed V

    I guess I’m left wondering if Aspyr set out to port a game that isn’t really enjoyable unless you own a newer Mac Pro (desktop)? Seems to me that’s a pretty small market for the effort and cost involved.

    I’m just gonna guess that this was never really the intent. So the question now is whether or not you guys plan to improve the game play experience so that it works well on a lower minimum spec (= larger market share). Or if that’s even possible?

    Good luck – I’m sure you’re working it. Any hints you wanna drop us would be appreciated.

  • Matt

    I’m running a 15″ MacBook Pro with the Intel Core i7 processor. Quite regularly, the game freezes when the diplomacy screen pops up. I cannot click on any of the diplomacy options or get back to the game. I have to force-quit Civ V and restart it.

  • Randy

    I have been playing Civ IV on my 3 year old MacBook for years with no problem. I now have a brand new MacBook which meets the minimum requirements (I think) and the game is almost unplayable because, as Nikolau’s message indicates, the game becomes unbearably slow after the map starts to open up. No matter what the reason, if this game cannot be played on a brand new MacBook then there should be a big fat warning that you need a serious gaming computer to play the game and Buyer Beware! The graphics are not that advanced so I really don’t understand why the requirements are so high. Does it make sense that a Civ IV fan would have to buy a new computer to play Civ V? It’s not like we’re playing Halo or something!

  • http://www.gameagent.com BlogLady

    @ Folks with Performance Issues. The two biggest things that cause gameplay issues on supported machines are screen resolution being too high, which causes issues around turn 300 when things start getting really busy; and running too many other things in the background. If you turn down your screen resolution and turn off your other stuff you should see an improvement. If you are running the game and experience further issues please submit a support ticket! support.aspyr.com.

  • Elhean

    Well this is not an answer actually… First of all, i5 4gb 330m machine should be able to push tihis game in 1440×900 easily. Especially on lowest settings.

    Second thing is that I tried resolutions down to 1024×768 with only a slight improvement, and it is ridiculous to accept that this machine can get us less then 5fps at this resolution.

    Third thing, I run civilization with NO applications in background.

    4th, I contacted the support and got vague answer similar to stuff You wrote here, with another vague statement that there is a patch that will address some of performance issues, but there is no ETA.

    I don’t want to brag and make problems to anybody, but I’ve waited for this game for months/years and now that I finally got it i get this lousy collection of bugs inside beautiful idea. Since Aspyr deals with people’s happiness You should pay attention on how do we feel and not try to make excuses and blur obvious fails… make a honest statement, accept Your failure to provide this game in playable form and honestly promise us a date when we will finally get to play Civ5 how it should be played.

    It’s not that hard…

  • Maja

    I full agree with above.
    Best Regards

  • fakt00r

    Are there some news about a patch? On Windows they get the next patch at 16. December. And on Mac? What about DLC like Babylon, Inka and Spain? Do we get them as well on Mac?

  • Jim

    They’ve told us every patch and DLC for PC will be turned around for Mac as quickly as humanly possible. What they haven’t told us is what kind of humans they are, or why humanly possible must be a restriction. (Seriously, they’ve not given dates on anything.)

    If I had a sig on this site, I think I’d paraphrase from The Game of Thrones:
    Patch is Coming.

  • http://none Michael H

    I have a 2009 Mac Pro with NVidia 8800 GT and 8GB of ram. This is a $4000 machine. The game just becomes unplayable by the 100th turn. Huge lag times, screen freezes. Entirely unenjoyable to play (even on LOW settings)

    I believe Aspyr has a potential crisis on their hands here. The bad word of mouth is all over chat forums and blogs– and a great deal of it criticizes not only Civ 5′s un-playablity, but Aspyr as a company. You guys are in trouble.

    So Aspyr: I suggest you work diligently on a patch to fix this. It’s completely illogical that a computer like mine would have these kind of issues. You obviously rushed development and testing of Civ 5 to get it out for the holidays. It’s disgraceful to charge $50 for a defective product.

    -Michael

  • Jim

    Those who criticize Aspyr’s product would do well to note the issues PC users had with their own 1.0 version. They were handed a very poor product to begin with. PC users have gotten many improvements already, and the Dec 16 patch should “fix everything”. Mac will catch up.

  • http://none Michael H

    Don’t release the product then. It’s obvious that Aspyr knew it was buggy and defective. I imagine their stockholders wanted to see some product shipped for the holidays, and all of us were duped into thinking we were buying a playable, entertaining product. Times are tough and I’m out $50.

    If Toyota, for example, knowingly sold a new model of car that had braking issues and a leaky cam shaft, they’d get punished. Gaming companies that release defective products deserve similar consequences. I think it’s just greedy.

  • fakt00r

    It’s frustrating… If we don’t get a patch (the same like on Windows) before the holiday season then Civilization V was my last game bought from Aspyr. And I will care that all my friends will think the same.

  • Randy

    Good to see I’m not the only one having issues and I agree with everything above. I will seriously consider before I ever buy another game from Firaxis, Aspyr etc. Whether there is a patch that fixes this or not it doesn’t matter. We spent $50 on something that does not work and we have all spent a lot of time trying to figure out if it was our computers or something else. This is not acceptable! There is no way such widespread issues could not have been known. Oh maybe one way, if you did ZERO testing before sending this out! I think everyone who bought this prior to whichever patch it is that fixes this deserves a credit of some sort.

  • Rakemon554

    It’s also a little suspicious that this game has been so universally maligned by mac gamers, but when you go to the aspyr support site: http://support.aspyr.com/ , there’s no mention of crippling lags and general un-playability.

    Like that Radiohead song: deee-niiiii-aaaaal

  • fakt00r

    @Rakemon554: Maybe censorship?

    I hope we get a patch this week. The lack of communication from Aspyr is disturbing.

  • Jim

    @Rakemon554 – My iMac meets the definition of the minimum requirement for Civ V, except with 4GB RAM instead of 2GB. Otherwise it’s the minimum CPU speed and the minimum graphics card. Yet I haven’t experienced any of these “universal” “crippling” “unplayable” issues. The internet has a fantastic way of turning a few people having issues into a global catastrophe.

    My biggest complaint right now is the automated worker bug, which replaces farms with trading posts at every opportunity. I don’t like putting workers on manual, but I have to now. PC users have the same bug.

    Many Macs are released with fantastically gorgeous screens at default high resolutions loved by graphic designers, but without the required hardware to drive those resolutions in 3D games. Users of these models need to lower their expectations (and their settings).

  • Menso

    Perhaps you have a different idea of ‘cripling’ or ‘unplayable’. Moving around the map is a horrendously slow experience, is it playable? Sure, with an extreme amount of patience… Should this game require such stupendous resources? No… Does the same game in Windows edition perform remarkably better on the exact same Macbook running Bootcamp? YES.

    I meet & exceed the minimum requirements, my videocard is a 9400M which isn’t in the supported list but performs remarkably fine with the Windows version of the game. It doesn’t seem to be so much of a Civ 5 issue but specifically a Civ 5 issue for Mac.

  • Jim

    @Menso – No, I don’t experience that issue. Moving around the map is just fine; perhaps it stutters a little when I do a fast transition across the world, but I don’t have to wait for it to think or load.

    Mainly what you’ve experienced is the difference the current implementations of DirectX and OpenGL. Hardware acceleration for OpenGL is just starting to come around, and (I’m guessing) isn’t ready for the 9400M. If it performed well enough, it would have been on Aspyr’s supported list.

    Also, PC Civ already has had 3 patches. One of them may have helped performance on your configuration.

    Due to a number of factors, but primarily driver support, comparing the same hardware in Windows/DirectX and OSX/OpenGL simply isn’t possible right now. Having an application perform well in one does not necessarily imply the other.

    You can certainly argue that a turn-based strategy game shouldn’t require so much out of a 3D engine, but you need to talk to Firaxis about that. Their game, their requirements. 2K did what they could on PC (and not without plenty of their own issues), and Aspyr did what they could on Mac.

    And finally. 4GB RAM should be listed as the minimum requirement for any Mac 3D game, from what I’ve seen. WoW performance improves dramatically going from 2GB-4GB; Civ may as well. You didn’t say what you had, but that’s a place you can look. I don’t work for Aspyr, so I can’t tell if you that will be an easy fix, or if the problem is solely 9400M drivers, but just in general, I would always recommend 4GB.

  • Menso

    4 GB DDR3 memory and a 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo…

  • Elhean

    @ Jim

    I have to admit that Your post is highly suspicious to me. In some way, and from reason unknown to me, You are trying to relativize this issue. But, people are not naive.

    My Macbook pro 4gb i5 330m is not custom made computer with gorgeous screen without hardware power to drive it. It is legally bought, full blown mac configuration with enough power to drive games way more demanding than civ. If we were talking about PC scene, I could imagine a guy with awkward but powerful combination of hardware and drivers that can make problems to a game, but we are talking about Macs.

    I’m sure there are configurations that drive this game well. Probably those configurations that were used to test the game. But what about the others? If there was a info that my Mac wouldn’t drive it, I wouldn’t buy it…

    So, our bragging and raving about lousy performance of this game is not stupid, is not problem of small number of extreme cases. It’s legitimate anger of owners of powerful computers that payed for game that they can’t play. It is normal to contact aspyr, it is normal to expect an answer, and it is highly unnecessary, unproductive and pointless of You to try to relativize our problem. Even if You prove that there is a lot more people that can play this well then those with problems, what is the point? Not to change it? TO make our wait longer? To make fun of us? Make us stupid? Protect Aspyr? Infuence PR?

    Just enjoy Your game in a way that we can’t.

    Or, if there are some traces of reason and understanding in You, help us get what You already have, and we all want. Send Your configuration to Aspyr and help them understand why it runs this game smoothly and how can we share this with You.

  • Jim

    I have the 2.4 GHz, 24″ iMac with the ATI Radeon HD 2600. Only upgrade is to 4 GB of RAM.

    The point of my posting was responding to the claim of “censorship” in the support site. I posit that while there are real people experiencing real issues, it’s far from universal, or even common. Further, if someone is experiencing issues on an unsupported video card, I can offer a possibility of why that card isn’t supported.

    My point about gorgeous screens without hardware to drive them is directed at Apple in particular. That’s the way they make some of their computers. They’re aimed at Photoshop, not 3D gaming.

    Caveats aside about laptops in general not being 3D gaming machines, your particular MBP should be fine, particularly since the 330m found its way on to the supported list. Whether it performs as well under OS X as it does in Windows depends mostly on the relative quality of the OpenGL and DirectX drivers for your card. If it performs terribly, that’s between you and Aspyr, and contacting them is certainly appropriate. But many of the fixes may be universal problems that are simply amplified on Mac but must be fixed on the PC side first.

  • Elhean

    Well, as far as I know EVERY single mac user I know in person has problems with Civ5. All of my friends who have bought it have problems. Actually, You are the first one I have ever heard of that hav no problems.

    Even in these comments above there is a pretty wide array of different configurations with huge problems, and this fact brings me to conclusion that this is actually a wide spread thing.

    Or am I completely wrong?

    If You want to continue this discussion, please provide us with a list of configurations that drive this game the way it should be driven. This will both help us understand You, and help Aspyr understand which hardware makes problems.

  • Mikel

    24″ iMac with nVidia 9400M and 4GB of RAM. I’ve spent dozens of enjoyable hours playing Civ V under OSX. Apart from the delay between turns, I don’t have any quibbles with the speed.

  • Jim

    Improper but illustrative analogy follows.

    Say 2 relatives of yours, males around 72 yrs old, suddenly depart the living. Which of these is the proper response?

    A) Grab a cart and stroll around the neighborhood yelling “Bring out yer dead!”, insisting every male around 72 yrs old be added to the cart, and curse the power that be for releasing defective life forms.
    B) Investigate the causes of each – and learn that one had an undetected heart condition, and one slipped off the roof while adjusting his TV antenna. Both tragic, and entirely unrelated.

    –

    The point here is that “everyone you know” does not constitute a trend. Nor, in fact, does “people who post on the internet”, because that group is dramatically unbalanced towards people that actually have problems. People like me & Mikel here with counterclaims are a small minority; most don’t spend the time to contribute if everything works fine for them.

    –

    Often, software failures can be diagnosed to be simple problems in the user’s control. They manifest when new software is tried that uses the hardware more than before, but the problem was always there. And in fact, the most common cause of slowdowns and crashes from graphics-intensive applications is improper ventilation – the air passages of the computer were clogged by dust, or sunk into a soft surface like a bed, or some such. Other times it turns out to actually be defective hardware needing a replacement. By far the LEAST common cause is a systemic failure rooted in the new software. Even the most cursory testing can weed those out. The failure *correlating* with running new software does not mean the new software *caused* the failure. Correlation is not, and does not necessarily imply, causality.

    You can ask why Civ V is so hardware intensive, but the fact remains it is. On Mac and PC both. Firaxis wanted “cool stuff”, and “cool stuff” is what got built.

  • Elhean

    You are a smart guy, but You are missing a point.

    Point of posts by people with problems is simple and straightforward. We want help with our problem.

    What is the point of Your gigasmart posts?

  • Jim

    My point is to have everyone with a problem to realize that they have the problem. Not everyone. Just them. Other people have problems too. Other people are not them. The problem other people have may not be their problem. And lots of people have no problem at all.

    So you should be much more successful, I would think, checking the simple things under your control and then working with Aspyr directly on your problem. Ranting about “A wide spread thing”, “universally maligned”, “censorship” and so on on a blog post is unproductive hyperbole, and get you nowhere closer to a solution than standing on one leg singing Canada’s national anthem. Using the provided tools – the support site, the phone #, and the email address – should accomplish much more, so long as you understand what they’re telling you and don’t dismiss it immediately because you disagree with it.

    Your answers will not be found here in the blog comments. Unless you have cat hair clogging your air vents. Then I can tell you where to send payment for my tech support. :)

  • Elhean

    And what would You say if I told You that I first contacted tech support, did everything they told me to, checked with MANY frinds, visited forums and in the end got here.

    Still, there is A LOT of peiple with problems, and we want solution. Aspyr obviously did something wrong since this kind of collective hate is not happening every time someone relases a game.

    So please mate, stop making this problem not being a problem since i it really wasn’t a problem aspyr will surely help me solve it individually. And others also…

  • Jim

    “This kind of collective hate is not happening every time someone relases a game.”

    You have no idea how wrong that is!

  • Jim

    Incidentally.. patch tomorrow.

  • Mikel

    “Incidentally.. patch tomorrow.”

    Source?

  • Jim

    Aspyr_Support twitter feed.

    http://twitter.com/#!/Aspyr_Support

  • Mikel

    Thanks… I tracked it down after asking. I wonder if this is the full catch-up patch and we will get to dominate our hapless Windows using friends. (Typed at my work PC) :)

  • independent lee

    @Elhean

    “I’m sure there are configurations that drive this game well. Probably those configurations that were used to test the game. But what about the others? If there was a info that my Mac wouldn’t drive it, I wouldn’t buy it…”

    Really?
    I really don’t doubt you are having issues, but that statement is ludicrous.
    All game companies place minimum requirements on the box or point of purchase. It is up to the consumer to take heed. The MSR’s posted by Aspyr for this game outline the machines they tested the game out on. If your system is not in within those, DON T BUY THE GAME. It doesn’t matter if your hardware is OVER or UNDER. My personal experience with Aspyr Support is that they will test the game on a specific Mac BEFORE you purchase it if you just contact them. Find another company that will do this.

    I am currently playing the game on a Intel Core 2Duo iMac- 2 GHz with below the recommended RAM and an unsupported HD 2400XT, and I can play the game just fine. It is slow towards the end of the game (all Civ. games are) But I haven’t had one single crash. AS a matter of fact, I have played about 3 games to conclusion with VERY few problems. Being below spec, why did purchase the game? I contacted support and asked them. In a couple of days after I submitted my ticket, they got back to me and said it ran a little slow, and might be problematic at later stages of the game. I made a calculated risk and purchased the game. I am satisfied with the game.

    Contact them they might help.

  • Michael H

    Jim obviously works for Aspyr :)

    Will download patch in good faith, but must reiterate my suspicion of the complete lack of acknowledgement from Aspyr of these gameplay issues. I personally think they’re in too deep, and don’t know how to fix our issues.

  • independent lee

    @Elhean
    Seriously?
    You say:

    “If You want to continue this discussion, please provide us with a list of configurations that drive this game the way it should be driven.”

    and

    “I’m sure there are configurations that drive this game well. Probably those configurations that were used to test the game. But what about the others? If there was a info that my Mac wouldn’t drive it, I wouldn’t buy it…”

    These are provides by EVERY REPUTABLE COMPANY THAT MAKES VIDEO GAMES! They are called Minimum System Requirements, and game companies provide them on every box or website they sell the game on. If your specs are not listed, don’t buy the game.

    I am currently playing the game on a Intel 2GHz iMac with a HD 2400XT card ( totally unsupported machine BTW) and I have played for weeks without a crash. Granted the game slows down towards the end, but ALL CIV GAMES DO THIS.

    I knew I wasn’t supported, but I contacted Aspyr Support to ask if it might work. 2 days after submitting a ticket, they responded saying that the game launches and plays, but it does slow down considerably towards the end of the game. I purchased the game anyway, and am completely satisfied.

    Find another game company that would do that.

    As far as MSRs and Mac hardware are concerned, Apple puts out a new hardware configuration almost monthly. Each new iteration has a new Graphics Card, different Drivers for that card etc.
    Your 330m is not on the supported list, but the 320m is (an earlier card). I find it highly dubious that I can play the game below the 2.4 GHz minimum with an unsupported card with no problems (not one crash in 3 completed games), but your game is unplayable. If the 320m can play it, but the 330m cant it is likely a driver or Quicktime issue.

    Wait for the patch, lower the resolution, play in windowed mode.

  • Menso

    @Mikel: it seems you have the same config as I do on my 13″ MBP and you don’t seem to have issues… you never see textures pop in? What config are you using (resolution, gfx settings, etc?)

    Anyway, glad to see there’s a patch coming, hope it will make stuff run more smoothly.

  • Elhean

    As the matter of fact, 330m is on the supported list. Also as 4gb and i5 is within optimal requirements.

    Also, I did it in window, with lowest settings.

    No significant improvement.

    I’m sure it is something with drivers, probably somethin with video support…

    That’s why am I making the noise.

    Hope patch will change it.

  • Mikel

    Menso: I’ll have to check my settings when I get home, but I suspect they are on the lower end of the spectrum. I do occasionally see graphics glitches, but they tend to clear up when running a new turn, or giving the system a second to refresh if I moved a large distance. None of these have stopped me from playing the game, so perhaps my tolerance for bugs is higher.

    Now I am wondering if I need to wrap up my current game tonight, in case they make changes to the save file configuration and invalidate my current run.

  • Menso

    @Mikel: I’ve been playing as well, but that’s because I love it… but to honestly say this game performs as one would expect or ‘hassle free’ would be a great overstatement imho.

  • Jim

    Mikel – The PC guys over at CivFanatics say the old save file format is supported. But if this is the big monster patch, it changes so many rules that many of the choices you made might be suboptimal now.

    Elhean – You may also want to be sure you’re up to date on Apple patches. By default it does this pretty automatically, but sometimes people turn them off. Your video driver update will come from there. You can also get smcFanControl and see if your computer is attempting to melt while you play, and adjust fan settings appropriately. (I run my fans about 50% higher than my Mac’s default.)

  • Mikel

    Jim: I am mostly playing for achievements at this point (a weakness of mine when it comes to Steam games) and still have the training wheels on at difficulty level 3. All I am really doing right now is grinding through the turns until a victory. It’s a sad life, but it’s mine. ;)

  • Chia

    Elhean I agree – the product is not functional as is . . . I keep getting the game to hang in window mode / with ‘ lower resolution and current Apple software updates – period : Game NOT functional

    Sorry Jim – it is NOT an overheating problem on the graphic card . . . i7, 8 gb ram SSHD May 2010 MacBook Pro and 300m g/c – well more than enough per Aspyr to run the game carefree, shame it hangs and is unplayable

  • Chia

    oops – that should be NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M

  • http://www.tourtouras.info Thanos

    Hello, I’m on an 27″ iMac i5@2.66 with 8GB of RAM, so I believe my system is a bit over the recommended one. I don’t play under full resolution (2560 x 1440) since there’s a grayed-out area when I do, but one-or-two-clicks lower, I don’t recall right now. Lately, I’ve been playing Civ 5 in a window, selecting an even lower resolution and didn’t notice any further sluggishness because of that.
    Civ 5 plays fine, no GFX glitches at all, no crashes (have completed a 5-civ game only though), no issues in general.

    EXCEPT:
    As soon as the maps clears from fog a little bit and you can see a full window of stuff and at least around 5 units are in sight, the fps start to drop dramatically. I’m not talking about full zoom-out, in which case I’m getting something like 15fps at best.
    I believe it’s the same for the Windows version (only a bit better, tried it through Parallels) and the culprit is the Civ 5 engine itself, that doesn’t switch to lower-resolution textures and lower-complexity items in time when zoomed out.

    The game is playable, but I wish it would run as smooth as when you’re panning around on the first 20 turns of a new game…

  • Jim

    @Chia – impressive rig, but what makes you say it’s not overheating? Your specs don’t tell me that (in fact, since it’s top of the line, and a laptop, it’s *more* prone to heat problems, not less). Only something that actually reads the internal temperature can say that. smcFanControl is one of those programs, and also lets you adjust fan speed to try to compensate.

  • Elhean

    Hey Jim, gonna be my patch? :)

    What’s up with this patch? Is it out yet?

  • Jim

    Twitter feed says 10 CST. So, “soon”.

    I also wish the feed told me if the patch catches us up to the PC version. I guess we won’t know until it starts downloading.

  • independant lee

    I do see some issues, but most of them are because I am on a slower than required Mac.
    Texture popping is a problem I see alot, but I can deal with that.
    Honestly, I have seen friends play the PC version and it is at least twice as buggy.
    The PC version of the game is buggy as hell, and Aspyr ports directly from the PC version of games.
    Alot of these problems are carried over from the PC port. At the same time, Aspyr has to rely on 2K to provide patches to fix the “legacy” issues before Aspyr can address them in their version of the game.

    Aspyr is kind of at the mercy of both Apple Updates and 2K’s ability to provide effective fixes to “legacy” issues.

    jus’ sayin’

  • http://www.tourtouras.info Thanos

    No, the patch does NOT catch up to the Windows version. Windows version released yesterday is 1.0.1.135 and on the Mac Update release note I am reading 1.0.0.621a. So, as always, OS X users will have to wait a few months before we catch up to the Windows users.

    Now, lets examine the changes…

  • Randy

    So I opened up a game that I have been painfully playing to see what Civ V is about and after the patch was run I see no change in performance except that the introduction now plays. The game is just as sluggish as before – still not worth playing. I don’t care about the introduction, I want to play the game but still cannot. Has anybody else seen any performance fixes with this “patch”?

  • thor

    Hey guys,

    i wonder if playing civ V is possible on my mac, which is doubtful because of the processor first of all and the graphic board second. can someone give me some useful information based on personal experience please? i really would like to play civ V, for i played all other parts and love it.

    my system specifications:

    MacBook Pro
    Systemversion: Mac OS X 10.6.2 (Snow Leopard)
    Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo
    Processor Speed: 2,26 GHz
    RAM: 4 GB
    Graphic Board: NVIDIA GeForce 9400M
    VRAM (total): 256 MB

    i also read about some users installing win on macs in order to play in win-mode, but… what a horrible idea!…

    thx and cheers,

    thor

  • Jim

    From the Patch Release post a ways up the screen:
    “Q:My hardware is not on the supported System Requirements list. Can I play the game?

    A:If you have a specific question about your system profile, submit a ticket at support.aspyr.com along with your system profile and our guys will actually try it out! (If we have the hardware). Try before you buy – can’t beat that as a service.”

    That said.. others have reported difficulty with the 9400.

  • Dave Kilby

    OK, I’ve read through most of the comments here. In a way I’m glad to see that I’m not the only one with game screwups (not issues – SCREW UPS!!!)

    Before I begin, let me say that I love Civilization. I’ve owned every one from Civ I on. This is the first time I’ve ever had issues. Also, the first time I’ve encountered Steam (coincidence? I don’t know).

    To the fanboys: no matter how you try to spin it – Aspyr never should have released the Mac version in it’s current state. It’s a patent fraud.

    I am running an 27″ iMac on OS 10.6.4 (supported); with a four core 2.8 Ghz i7 processor (supported); 4 GB 1067 MHZ DDR3 memory (twice requirement); my graphics chipset is a ATI Raadeon HD 4850 (supported).

    If Civ V freezes up on my computer (usually around move 615 or so), what the hell computer did they troubleshoot this game on before releasing it?

    I’ve troubleshooted, followed their online instructions, even lowered the resolution and the graphics details and downloaded the patch. Still the same old problems.

    And then to have the fanboys (employees?) try to insinuate that this is a user problem? This is a programer’s problem, plain and simple.

    Next time game designers, tell marketing the game will be ready when the game is ready, not at some market timing date.

    In the meantime, get these problems fixed NOW!!!!!

  • Randy

    Ok, started a new game and am at about turn 250 and things are better, not perfect but definately better

  • Ankerstar

    I want my money back from stream! This is outrageous!

  • Andy

    Finally just went to the Apple store and bought the boxed game, and can’t get the damn thing to install correctly. It keeps trying to update Steam, downloads 33 out of 34 mb, then reports a proble, saying “be sure you’re connected to the network”, time after time. Incredibly frustrating. Aspyr, you’ve really screwed this one up, from all the unhappy accounts here and elsewhere.
    I have no choice but to return the game, since it simply WILL NOT install or work correctly. Shoddy product, shoddy support. Good luck.

  • Anonymous

    complete pain in the ass to install and then it does not even work. go fuck yourself firaxis

  • Travis Butler

    Count me as one of those extremely dissatisfied with Civ V. Picked up the boxed copy a couple of weeks ago, finally got around to installing it last night – or trying to. And then the issues began…

    * I specifically bought the box, not the downloadable copy, because I wanted a physical backup copy of the game and because I didn’t want to spend hours downloading the content. So I insert the disc, and find the only thing on it is the Steam installer. No physical backup, hours of download time. Not Cool, Aspyr. Not Cool At All.

    * Download experience was long, torturous and tedious, going in fits and starts with many interruptions – on a 1.5MBps cable connection. This is Steam’s bailiwick, but Aspyr still bears ultimate responsibility because they chose to use Steam and force a download install.

    * Download finally finished this morning, fired it up for a quick check before going into work – and encountered the dreaded “This game needs Steam.” error message, despite Steam being active and logged in. Sent a support ticket to Aspyr, got the ‘This is a problem on Steam’s end, we’re trying a workaround but ultimately they have to fix it.’ Which sucks – and again, while it might be a problem with Steam, it’s ultimately Aspyr’s issue for deciding to depend on Steam.

    * Even that wouldn’t be so bad… except Aspyr then unceremoniously closed my support ticket. Excuse me? I’m trying to be polite about this, but that response is simply unacceptable. I understand that the problem may lie on Steam’s end. (In fact, after reading on Steam’s forums about the number of problems Mac users have had over the last few days, I could easily believe that the problem is entirely on Steam’s end.) But that DOES NOT ABSOLVE ASPYR OF THE RESPONSIBILITY TO KEEP THEIR CUSTOMERS UPDATED. Closing the ticket feels like Aspyr is washing its hands of the issue, and throwing everything back on us. “You want to have your game actually work? Well, it’s *your* job to keep visiting forums and checking for status updates until this is fixed. We aren’t going to make the effort to notify you.”

    Well, I’m sorry, but no. I paid my $50 to Aspyr, not Steam. Aspyr is the one who chose Steam for a delivery vehicle – not me. I did not want to deal with Steam. I specifically tried to avoid dealing with Steam. It may be Steam’s issue, but Aspyr bears the responsibility for making sure they fix it, and for notifying its customers when it is fixed.

    Right now, I’m honestly regretting sending my money to Aspyr instead of buying the PC version for cheaper and getting cross-platform for free through Steam. Yes, I do believe in supporting Mac developers, for supporting the platform – but that needs to run both ways. If I still have to deal with the same Steam issues either way, and if I’m getting blown off by Aspyr support, then what the heck is the point of supporting them as a Mac developer?

  • Jim

    Travis – looks like you just hit Steam on a bad day. It doesn’t have many of those, but it had a couple this week. Aspyr Support’s twitter feed directed people to the Steam forum where they discuss the issue, people posted workarounds, and ultimately Valve themselves got a fix in. This problem affected many more games than Civ.

    If it were Aspyr’s choice, they likely would have released Civ V as GameAgent DRM, not Steam. Steam was chosen for them by Firaxis (or 2K?) even before the porting agreement was in place.

    I agree in a sense that Aspyr’s support should try to keep tickets like these open. If I call Cablevision and report a problem with my internet connection, and they say “Oh, the problem is with Cox”, I don’t expect to have to call Cox, I just want to hear when Cablevision tells me its working. But, on the other hand, Steam does have a much better consumer-facing support area than something like Cox, and handing off to them wasn’t entirely unreasonable.

  • Elhean

    Dear Jim,

    I think You are slowly loosing Your ground now.

    Civ5 is screwed up. It’s a fact.

    Please fix it, so we can continue to love Civ.

  • Jim

    I wasn’t aware I had gained any ground to lose :)

    I don’t think it’s too much to ask for people to blame the correct people for the problems they have, and to not blame anyone at all for problems they assume everyone else must be having, but in fact are not. The way people here want to blame Aspyr for the failure to locate Osama bin Laden and for the Gulf of Mexico Oil disaster all at once is .. well.. fascinating.

    –

    You know what I did yesterday? I spent 6 hours getting Civ to run in Bootcamp, on my wife’s Macbook with a 9400M. I don’t know why anyone thinks the PC side has it any better. Windows updates that spawn Windows updates that spawn Windows updates. Video driver updates via Windows update. Oops, wrong ones, more video driver updates via nVidia’s website. Antivirus updates. Oops, Steam hates this Anitivirus. Get another Antivirus. Update that one. Yeesh. And finally, when the game launched, it ran.. playable, even, I guess.. but I’ll probably have to turn off the voiceovers, as there’s a noticeable slowdown when they play, like someone trying to play a 45rpm vinyl record at 33rpm. (Grats if you’re old enough to know what that is.)

    –

    Aspyr has basically 2 jobs in Civ V:
    - Convert Windows-specific DX9 graphics calls to OpenGL.
    - Compile the thing as a Mac OS binary.

    Anything not specifically related to that is not their fault.

    You can say the game is unfinished.. but lots of PC people will tell you the same thing. 2K developed and Firaxis released a poor quality product. Aspyr had a choice (and I’m assuming it was a choice) of 1) Wait until the game was *actually* finished before porting it. Under this option, they might or might not even be able to start the port even now. And this also reinforces the notion that Mac releases must always be a year after PC releases of the same game, at a time when Mac sales are climbing and could stand to get the gaming monkey off their back. OR 2) Take what was given, and do the best they could. This gets a game to market faster, with the same (some, especially Aspyr, would say better) experience the PC guys have, assuming the performance of both would improve over time. Obviously, 2) was the chosen route.

    –

    If you have graphics errors, you should probably blame Aspyr.
    If you have graphics performance problems, particularly in relation to the same hardware running in OS X vs Bootcamp, well, there may be a few things Aspyr can do, but you really should blame Apple for an incomplete OpenGL implementation or AMD/ATI or nVidia for lack of quality OpenGL hardware accel in the video drivers.
    If you have a problem specifically with the “high res” bug and Aspyr’s workaround, you should blame 2K.
    If you have graphics-related crashes, you should probably blame Aspyr.
    If you have non-graphcis-related crashes, you should probably blame 2K.
    If you have gameplay problems, you should probably blame 2K.
    If you have game *design* problems (like the no-stacking rule), you should probably blame Firaxis.
    If you think the game was released far too soon, you should probably blame Firaxis.
    If you’re having problems downloading or patching the game, or playing online at all, you should blame Steam.
    If you’re upset at the choice of Steam, you’re back to Firaxis.
    If you’re angry at the lack of PC-Mac multiplayer, the blame goes back to 2K and Firaxis, to get them to hold PC patches until Mac catches up.

    –

    An actual Aspyr employee wouldn’t be able to say that. :)

    –

    The lead designer of Civ at Firaxis has quit. Nobody but he and Firaxis know the real reason, but here are a couple popular theories:
    - He wanted to release the game “when it was ready” – aka Blizzard style – but Firaxis insisted on releasing whatever was available when the calendar said it was time to ship.
    - He wanted to release a more hardcore game, and Firaxis wanted a more accessible (Civ Revolutions) type game. Or vice versa.

    Or perhaps he wanted to spend more time with his family, or is getting sucked into Blizzard. Who knows.

  • Dave Kilby

    That’s all very nice, Jim. But “doing the best they could” doesn’t justify charging $50 for a knowingly flawed product. And, don’t tell me they didn’t know it was flawed.

    As to whose fault it is, judging from the plethora of complaints, it seems there’s enough screw-ups to go around all the bases (Aspyr, 2K, Firaxis and Steam).

    What I’m curious about is how did they not catch most of these mistakes in beta testing? Now, I’m running a Mac that not only meets their minimum system requirements but also their recommended system requirements and still it screws up every time.

    As to “having a better experience” than the PC crowd? That just means that the PC crowd got screwed as well. And why are you insinuating that releasing it flawed was better than not having it released as early. In what universe is that justification? The end result is that there are a lot of Civ fans that are really P.O.’d now. I’ve run a few businesses in my time, and I can tell you that a business model like that is a fast road to going out of business.

    Anyway, my advice to you (if you really aren’t an employee of any of the culprits) is too quit defending the idiots and go find a job spin doctoring for the Republican Party. They could use a man like you.

  • Travis Butler

    Well, I’ll be fair. The Steam update did finally run today, and after the update Civ V did work. And the Aspyr people did send me a follow-up, despite the original notice that the ticket was closed.

    And so far, at least, the game is running decently – on a Core i7 with 8 GB RAM, I’d certainly hope so! :)

    That being said, I’m still not that happy with the way the game has been handled. Whether it’s Aspyr or Firaxis, I’m still not happy with the decision to use Steam, or the decision to make it a download-only product even if you bought the retail box. I’m not happy with the way Aspyr’s support system sends a ‘ticket is closed’ email, either, as it gives a very bad impression if the problem is not resolved – especially if in fact the ticket is not de facto closed, and Aspyr support is planning on sending an update. And again, while I can certainly agree that the technical issue was caused by Steam, I didn’t buy my game from Steam – I bought it from Aspyr. Thus Aspyr/Firaxis holds the ultimate responsibility for making sure that Steam does its job – they’re the ones who contracted with Steam.

  • Jim

    @Dave – I would say if a mistake was made, it was made in September when the PC version was released. Deadline-driven releases are industry-standard pretty much everywhere except Blizzard, though. That put the Mac port in an impossible position – port a bad product, or lose sales to Bootcamp while waiting for a good enough product to port. They made the choice I might have made, and likely had nothing further they alone could to to improve 1.0 when the released it.

    That said – you shouldn’t be experiencing constant crashes. Have you tried actually calling or emailing Aspyr support? And are you sure you’re not mistaking a crash for just a really long CPU turn (which has been reported, and happens in Windows)?

    @Travis – If I had to guess, I’d say the support department gets feedback or bonuses based on time-to-close on their tickets. I’ve seen this sort of thing before on other companies. It heavily incentivizes preemptively closing tickets, even if you intend to follow up. It takes a serious culture change (and, usually, the removal of the incentive) to stop this.

    I don’t know anything about the box install process, as my installs have been through Steam. I have heard others (PC side too) say that the way the installation is set up, you end up downloading it through Steam, and you have to try very hard (like, disconnect from the network) to get it to install off the disk. *shrug*

  • Björn Flóki

    Extremely disappointed Civ fan here. I have a brand new Macbook Pro 2.66 GHz Core i7, 4GB memory, NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M graphics cards, and my Civ 5 is lagging severely. The graphics settings are all on the lowest quality. It’s already slow from the beginning, then gets progressively worse as you play and unplayable about 50 turns in. I have no other programs running.

    Is there anything to be done about this? I was so looking forward to playing this all holiday, but there’s no way I can play the game this laggy.

    I’ve submitted a ticket to Aspyr, but I doubt this will solve anything – they’ll probably just tell me I need to get a faster processor, RAM or graphics card but come on! A brand new powerful laptop should be able to play a time based strategy game!

    So frustrated.

  • Dave Kilby

    @Jim – I am still trying to figure out the rationality of putting out a product with MAJOR problems. That’s a sure fire way to lose customers PERMANENTLY! No business that wants to stay in business follows this model. (And yes, I am aware of Microsoft and their history of fouled up products.) MS had a few things going for them that Aspyr, Firaxis, Steam and 2K don’t. And even MS is showing the results of their screw-ups. They’re no longer #1, I’m not even sure if they’re #2 – they could be down to #3 or 4. Apple beats them out, Google probably does and I’m not sure where Yahoo fits into the ratings. Apple and Google screw up occasionally, but they get the problems fixed FAST!!! And, neither one of them ever let something this buggy loose.

    Of course, I shouldn’t be experiencing continual crashes! DUH! However, I am!! And, it’s not a really long CPU turn. Unless of course that really long CPU turn is over 30 minutes.

    Also, I have contacted support(?) So far, it’s been a game of “Pass the Buck”.

    @Bjorn – Hate to be the bearer of bad news here, but a faster processor or graphics card may not help. I’m running a 27″ iMac on OS 10.6.4; with a four core 2.8 Ghz i7 processor; 4 GB 1067 MHZ DDR3 memory and my graphics chipset is a ATI Raadeon HD 4850. I meet and/or exceed all system recommendations and CIV V still freezes every time.

  • shawn

    anyone else having the same problems i am… or know of a fix?

    i purchased the digital download of civ v from aspyr thanksgiving weekend and played it for a day or two. it worked fine on my macbook pro, then i got busy with work and haven’t had time to go back to it. when i went to play it again this weekend, steam downloaded an update to the game, and now the game doesn’t work. when i click play, it tells me

    You can’t open the application Civilization V because it is not supported on this type of Mac.

    i have a 2009 macbook pro 2.53 ghz, 4 gb ram, nvidia geforce 9400m

    i have read that this isn’t a supported graphics card, but other people have been running the game with it. also, i ran the game on this computer a month ago!

    what changed? how do i fix it?

    thanks!

  • Shawn C

    My game is now locking up upon clicking the ‘begin your adventure’ button after the intro screens and setup. It’s always worked great before.

    I tried doing a fresh install, but no luck.

    I have a brand new iMac 21.5 that’s a month old with 8gb of ram and plenty of hard drive room — ATI 5670 with 512mb ram.

  • Jim

    @Dave – I think only one publisher consistently resists that pressure, and that is Blizzard. For other companies, the pressure to meet a certain deadline for sales / stock price / etc. reasons often defeats the desire to release a quality product. This is habitual throughout the software industry. And again, the fault for this really goes back to Firaxis and their PC release. There really is very little in terms of Mac-specific problems in Civ V; most of what has been since was seen first by the PC crowd. But once that was released, Aspyr was going to continue to lose sales to Bootcamp if they sat on the Mac port and waited for the PC version to be patched. (Something people often forget is that the average turn-based strategy gamer doesn’t really care if it runs at 5 FPS and they get to watch tiles repaint in real time.)

    Also, I caution you to not mistake “Pass the Buck” for “Diagnose the Problem”. Much like their children, people always staunchly refuse to accept the possibility that their own computer might be at fault, but often it is. A missing patch/driver, an incorrect setting, bad RAM, a hard drive error, a ventilation issue.. all real problems, and all have the possibility of only manifesting in 1 game, and all are vastly more likely than an error in the Civ V codebase that only occurs on your computer, but not the identically specced one they have in the lab.

  • Pissed

    I get the error message “This game needs Steam. Please make sure the Steam client is running, logged on Steam account…”.

    I removed Steam and all Civ V support files. Reinstalled everything from scratch. Still the same error. WTF ?

    I should have torrented the Windows version rather than paying for the Mac version.
    My mistake, won’t happen again.

  • Jim

    “A pothole in my driveway gave my car a flat tire, so I’m going to start stealing cars.”

    I really don’t get it.

    BTW, Pissed, not everybody gets that Steam message. I sure don’t.

  • Ernst Traag

    How long will it take before a patch will come that will make it possible for mac-owners to play multiplayer games with PC-owners? It is really frustrating to buy Civ5 on steam in the “civ-weekend” just to find out I cant play it with my friends..

    • http://www.gameagent.com Russ Looney

      @Ernst: Unfortunately, it’s difficult to put a specific date or timeline on it. We had thought/hoped that the latest patch would take care of that, but obviously that didn’t happen. We’re constantly working with 2K/Firaxis to keep up to date with the PC version and to work towards Mac to PC multiplayer.

      • Ernst Traag

        It’s been three months, and I still haven’t been able to play with my friends. This really is unacceptable. Unfortunately i can’t get my money back since i bought it on steam. Any ETA on when mac users will be able to play with windows users?

  • Joe Garcia

    I seriously want my money back. I totally got ripped off. When you purchase something that is only 50% capable you should either be warned or pay 50% of the price. This is the first and last Aspyr/2k game I will ever purchase. I will never recommend either company…. ever.

  • Henrique Gontijo

    Thanks for the help about getting Civilization V running on external monitor on macbook. It’s only in your blog that I’ve found this tip.

  • Austin

    Ok I bought civ 5  because I loves civ revolution so much on xbox but when I play it the intro movies laggs real bad and I really want to c it y is it so laggy!

  • Silje

    Just bought this game, and haven´t played much, and now I got message “can´t run Civ V cause some files are damage etc. Well how can that happen? I have worked with games and programs for 20 years now and that never happend before. So I have done everything Steam told me to do (WHY DO WE NEED STEAM?????) And every time a new error comes up. Is this possible??? I´m so angry right now, you can´t imagine!!!  What can I do? Right now I´m wondering if you have the old version out there without this Steam-crap so I can bye that instead – but right now – really angry!

  • http://twitter.com/davidjblevine David Levine

    HelloI have just purchased Civ5 from the App store and I wish to play it on an external screen.I have followed the instructions to hold down CMD whilst opening the game and I do get the config screen – but my only two options are window or full screen. Even when this config screen is on my external screen the game on either option only plays on the laptop screen.Please assist.David

  • Chris

    Hi,

    Been playing Civilization V for a few weeks with no problems.  (Purchased from the Mac online store).  I installed an upgrade for the game from the Mac store and the game stopped working.  Now when I launch the application the Civ V icon briefly appears then disappears from the application bar at the bottom of the screen.

    Can anybody tell me what is going on or how to fix this?

    Thanks,

    Chris
      

  • Robert

    Starting Civ V with the command key to get the display options no longer seems to work. Is there a setting to force that back on again in a plist or somesuch?

  • koa

    files to describe the problem:
    C:UsersSkarbyAppDataLocalTempWERD097.tmp.WERInternalMetadata.xml
    C:UsersSkarbyAppDataLocalTempWER3FCE.tmp.appcompat.txt
    C:UsersSkarbyAppDataLocalTempWER4175.tmp.mdmpwhat i have to do soo i can fix it???pls anyone help!!!

    i have windows 7 ultimate 32-bit graphic card gforce 8800gt and motherboard intel core 3.00ram 4(able to use 3)

  • Alex

    Just setup second monitor with my macbook pro, but Civ 5 stays only on my laptop screen. holding command only opens finder to the folder i installed Civ 5. Please patch so that Civ can be played on multiple screens and so that mac users can play online with PC users.

  • Robin T

    Since the most recent update to allow Windows 8 the graphics are totally screwed up. I deleted the game and reinstalled…but I wish to hell I could roll back to the previous (non-WIN8) version that worked. I hate it now.

    • matulaj

      Unfortunately, I can’t really help you with your PC issues. Please contact 2K Games for PC issues. Here’s their Civ Support site:http://support.2k.com/categori… If that doesn’t help you can always contact their support directly by putting in a trouble ticket:http://support.2k.com/anonymou… Good luck!